FRANTIC aid workers pleaded last night for the release of a young British human rights worker kidnapped with her parents in the Gaza Strip.

Gunmen bundled Scots-born Kate Burton, 25, and her mum and dad into a car in an area close to the border with Egypt.

Kate, who has spent three months working at the Al-Mezan human rights centre in Rafah, had taken a few days off to show them around the town as they visited her.

An official at the organisation said: "We are working without stop to try to secure the release of Kate. Our organisation will work throughout the night trying to contact the people who have taken her."

The family were snatched at about 4pm local time, 2pm in Britain, when gunmen stopped Kate's car.

They were put into a white Mercedes which sped off. Security vehicles chased the car but lost it.

The aid official added: "There is a lot going on here. Everyone in the organisation has come to the offices to work hard for Kate's release.

"We are very, very hopeful and we are doing everything we can. It is so busy in the offices because everyone is working really hard.

"Everybody at Al-Mezan, all of her friends and colleagues, is praying for her release. We are all on the phone and talking to as many people as possible to solve this situation.

"We are trying to contact all the security institutions, the police and everybody involved.

"Our staff are looking for her, we have some volunteers looking for her. We are searching all the areas to find her and have her safe.

"You try to protect everybody here but sometimes you cannot control everything." He added: "Her parents were visiting her. She was trying to take them around to show them the area."

But he said the organisation believes the family may be released "soon" - after a string of kidnappings of foreigners ended with the hostages being freed unharmed.

"We are praying that Kate and her family will be released soon. That is the most important thing to us," he said.

No organisation had claimed responsibility for the kidnapping last night.

The Foreign Office in London said only: "We are in a position to confirm reports of three Britons missing in the Occupied Territories. At this stage we have no further details." Al-Mezan said Kate had been working as an "international co-ordinator" for the centre, which monitors human rights violations, provides legal aid and seeks to promote democracy and humanitarian issues.

The incident is the latest in a series of kidnappings in Gaza apparently aimed at undermining Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as he tries to establish order following Israel's withdrawal in August.

A week ago two teachers at an American school - one Australian and one Dutch - were abducted in the increasingly chaotic territory. They were later released.

Rival gangs rule the streets and foreigners are snatched to blackmail the government, although the victims are usually released unharmed. In most cases the kidnappers were seeking jobs in the Palestinian security forces or the release of imprisoned relatives. President Abbas's critics have accused him of giving in to kidnappers' demands, encouraging more abductions.

Middle East expert John Strawson said it was likely the family would be released unharmed, adding: "It will be a big change to the situation if anything happened to them."

Mr Strawson, a reader in law at Birzeit University in the Palestinian West Bank, went on: "Unlike in Iraq the kidnappings are not so much aimed at foreigners as at embarrassing Mahmoud Abbas and trying to show he has no control over the Gaza Strip.

"The main aim is just to demonstrate that no one is safe. There is complete chaos in Gaza with a total breakdown of the Palestinian Authority's control.

"We are seeing a stepping up of this activity but I suspect it is still something quite different from what is happening in Iraq."

Five days ago the Foreign Office tightened its travel advice against visits to the Gaza Strip following the kidnap of the two Westerners. Britons now are "strongly advised" against all travel there.

KIDNAPPERS in Iraq last night released a video of a French engineer snatched three weeks ago - and denounced the "illegal French presence" in the country.

And former German Deputy Foreign Minister Juergen Chroberg, his wife and three children were kidnapped in Yemen yesterday.

Mr Chroberg, 65, a member of former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's government, and his family were on a private trip at the invitation of the country's former ambassador to Germany.